Spoilers for the end of Phantom Liberty and other endings in Cyberpunk 2077
Butch:
OK, done. Sent So Mi to the moon. Killed Reed. Johnny was happy. That scene waiting for the ship to launch was pretty amazing. Still don't know what happened to Alex. Did I miss something?
Aaaaandddd.....as I was feeling bad that I haven't had much to talk about, went back, redid the whole thing and played the "new" ending for the game all the way to the end. I really didn't like it. I also fear it's canon (for reasons I will share if we've all played it) and, if that's the case, I really, REALLY didn't like it.
Did y'all play that?
Did a lot.
Feminina:
I assume that's what I played through (getting the surgery from the NUSA?), but in any case I'm not going back to play anything again, so as far as I'm concerned everything is open for discussion.
Loothound:
So, you stuck with So Mi. They sure gave you every opportunity to turn your back on her, didn't they. "Oh, Songbird lied to you again. You want to change your mind?" Feels like it happened four or five times, at least. I, also, stuck with her and sent her to the moon and was happy with how it turned out. Waiting for the rocket to take off was a very satisfying thing, and I was surprised that, for once, Johnny didn't seem to have any snark for the occasion.
First time I got there, I tried just walking past Reed and he killed me in one shot. Hard to believe, but I get where they're coming from.
Yeah, what Feminina said. Do you mean when you decide to give her to Reed, or what new ending?
Feminina:
And if that ending is what we're talking about...I didn't hate it.
It certainly wasn't a 'happy' ending. In fact, it was pretty miserable there, trying to call everyone you know. It wasn't necessarily what I would pick as 'my' ending.
But as AN ending for that story, it was...actually fairly poetic and, in a melancholy way, kind of beautiful.
Butch:
Yeah, that's the one. I don't think we HAD to do that if we took Reed's deal, given that Johnny urged us not to several times before the point of no return, but yes. That one.
Feminina:
We definitely didn't have to. There on the balcony, we could have totally done one of the other endings instead. Just never call Reed back.
And, if I were playing the whole game straight through, I don't think I would call Reed back. I felt bad about the way Johnny went out in that one (though he seemed to forgive you, there before the sedative kicked in).
And man, trying to call people and having them all have moved on, or died, or started hating you (I had no idea Panam felt that strongly about me!), that was rough.
But the way that, in the end, you kind of turn and walk off into the crowd, just another NPC in Night City – I kind of loved that. You built yourself up from nothing through hard work but also a lot of random luck, and now luck made you nothing again.
Except not really nothing: as Misty says, you're just another human now. That's not nothing, it's just not what we're used to in a game. And hey, guess what...the game is over.
We opened with a character who becomes the PC, the most important person in the game world, and as we close, we are no longer the PC. No longer the most important person in the world. V goes off and does something that's no longer under our control.
I like the sense of symmetry there.
Butch:
I didn't like it.
First, it made every single choice you made irrelevant. Every single one. Now, that may well have been the point, but....no. This is an RPG. The message might have been "Well, that's life, player. The choices you make ARE irrelevant in the grand scheme of things," but that's still cheap. Sure, Delamain there says "We all lap up our fuel, but the point is the journey," and you could say "Sure, the choices were irrelevant, and the fact you struggled over them was a waste of time, but wasn't the game fun?" and I can still hate that.
I also don't like V's smile at the end, before she walks into the crowd. This "You're free!" Why would she LIKE being an NPC? Why, after all that, is she "free?" She's broke, she's lonely...the game GLORIFIES this? Really? All those quests to get Eddies, all the apartments, all the romance...that held her back? That kept her from being free? Now that she's poor and homeless and alone, that's GOOD? I don't know, man. I'd like to be rich with Judy in an apartment.
It also makes no sense. OK, no chrome. Where's my gun at? That seemed to work.
What REALLY worries me is that they left the idea of her going to work at Langley open. That whole "I'll think about it" makes me fear Agent V in the sequel. I do not want to see Agent V in the sequel. That would make this canon, that would be cheesy, I would hate the fuck out of that.
Feminina:
I don't think every choice you made becomes irrelevant at all.
Whatever you did before that point still happened in the game world. Your choices (other than the one to call Reed back and take the surgery) may be irrelevant TO YOU after this, since it no longer matters whether you accumulated this loot or that loot, or what build you went for, but there's a whole world out there that V's actions impacted along the way. All the people you helped are still helped, all the people you murdered are still dead.
You personally aren't rich in a penthouse, true, but you theoretically were never the only person who mattered in the world. Now you genuinely aren't.
Also, you made a choice to accept the surgery, and everything that happened after is a result of that decision. I feel like that's a pretty solid example of choices being relevant. There were a lot of things you could have done, and if you picked this one, here's what happened.
I'm also doubtful you'd ever see Agent V, if only because no single Agent V could sum up all the different character appearances people could have selected (these were largely erased in the end, but skin color and sex are still kind of distinctive).
Although maybe he/she could be disguised with that high-tech gear we tried out!
I could see hearing about Agent V in passing, though. I could also see hearing about/from Fixer V if you work in Night City, but again, I'm doubtful they'd show you a face, unless disguised.
Butch:
Hmm. Fair. Choices would matter, I suppose.
I still don't get the smile. The smile made no sense.
Also, as an aside, I don't know if it was a glitch or not, but, in the final cutscene, when V turned and smiled and got lost in the crowd, she was bare assed naked. Maybe it was a metaphor. I'll go with metaphor, and not glitch. Still, it was pretty funny seeing this tattooed, bareassed naked woman just "become anonymous."
I have hope it wasn't canon because the game seemed to urge you not to do it, and almost scolded you for doing it. Sure, Johnny was pressing you not to do it because he was going to die, but, all the same, that felt like the game all "No, really, storm Hiroshi tower, please." Didn't it?
Games do do that.
Loothound:
God dammit! Why is it that today is when we're having this conversation, and I'm swamped with shit and barely have time to check my work email. Fuck.
Short version: maybe in that ending V is freed from the responsibility of having to DO things as if they mattered in the big picture. V starts to get a little power, and is no longer a tiny fish scrambling for significance. Street Cred, Eddies, power, all start to just accumulate. Things aren't just a scramble for survival. V starts to feel like they can DO something with all of this. Make a difference somehow. For themselves, for Night City, for the world maybe. Yet, every time we try to do something that might make a difference, that might change things, it just gets more muddled and hard to figure out what the good thing is. We can take down mighty corporations, change the leadership landscape of Dogtown, even shift the landscape of the NUSA, and yet nothing gets better. Nothing changes. Maybe having all that cyberware ripped out freed V of a misguided sense of responsibility.
Feminina:
Always that way!
And yeah, hm. That's a good thought. Especially considering our recent discussion of Hands and Myers and people who are trying to control things and get people to do stuff. In contrast to those characters, V's motivation was never presented as being about trying to amass personal power – she's just been trying to survive.
She DID amass a great deal of personal power in the sense of being a significant figure in the mercenary world, but there wasn't an ambition to do more...and yet we've been pulled into the machinations of those who are trying to do more, and have kind of had to make similar types of decisions about who deserves a second chance, who deserves to succeed, who deserves to live or die. And as you say, although we've done our best, we haven't really changed anything.
Maybe it is a kind of relief to just have all the great responsibility that we are told comes with this great power stripped away.
As for me, I didn't read the smile as happy, exactly, so much as a kind of "well, what the hell, here we go" kind of thing. Why not smile? What else can she do? "Screw it, I'm still here!"
Loothound:
That's how I read the smile, too. As acceptance, or a kind of letting go. Maybe similar to what Akito was dealing with. Her look, I believe intentionally, reminded me of a medical patient. Someone who is dealing with/has dealt with a serious illness, but has found peace with it—even if the end is near or inevitable.
V, like all humans, is essentially powerless in the face of existence. The money, Cred, and chrome perhaps create an illusion of power. Maybe giving it up has been an eye opening experience.
Butch:
Hmm. I can see that. Accepting the fact that nothing ever changes or, if it does, who cares? I found it interesting that I told those goons that I knew people! Important people! I know padre, I did things for him! They were all "So what? He lost Dogtown." All those gigs and for what?
I have a thought, but a) Looty is busy and b) not like we have another game to talk about tomorrow.
OK, I'm liking it more, but I still don't LIKE it.
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